Artistic Integrity
part one of many to come
Insincerity and creative work are antithetical to each other and that’s the difference between something feeling like art/an emotional endeavor and a product to be consumed and tossed aside.
That’s why when your favorite author comes out with a sequel 20 yrs later that happens to coincide with a film release of your original favorite, it feels empty and removed from the initial spark of the initial project.
Or when a singer you usually enjoy puts out an album that seems a bit disconnected and ephemeral compared to their previous/typical work, even if it has merits of its own.
Phoning in art is like faking an orgasm. It might fool some people, but it’s not going to fool everyone. We can always tell when art is inauthentic, half-baked, capitalistic art. It’s like a mass-produced TJ Maxxx Art piece vs a one-of-a-kind.
That’s not to say the intent is always there to phone it in. There can be some really deep pockets of thoughtfulness and sincerity within an unrealized project. Also, some art is misunderstood when it first comes out, and that’s fine, too.
At the end of the day, good art is not reactionary. It has to come from internal alchemy; art is about the artist being transformed and living to tell the tale, and the viewer/listener/audience being moved by the experience of interacting with the art. But there is the secret - the intent cannot be “to move.” The intent is to display the beat of your heart at the moment you were changed, in the best language or medium you can use. Your raw emotions, experiences, and ideas are what make people feel like you’re (to borrow from Roberta Flack) reading the audience’s letters aloud. And that cannot come from centering the audience in your work.
Making the universal specific and the specific universal is a byproduct of sincerity in art, not an ingredient you can purchase and sell.
Thank you for this post. As 2025 ended and 2026 has begin, I've found myself back in the flow of writing, or poeming, and hopefully of publishing even here on substack. A question I continually, and even this morning, work on unpacking and deconstructing is the what of a poem, not to figure out what makes a poem a poem, more like the substance and energy and transformative energy of poeming, and I even see essays and prose as the act of poeming, jazz as poeming, living as poeming. The integrity you're writing about lines up with this energetic act and question of poeming and I'm looking forward to seeing your next posts.